Reese Witherspoon — Movies, TV Shows & Roles

Producer · Actor

1976-03-22 · New Orleans, Louisiana, USA · Female

51 series in the catalog

Laura Jeanne Reese Witherspoon (born March 22, 1976) is an American actress and producer. She is the recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, and two Golden Globe Awards. In 2021, Forbes named her the world's highest-paid actress, and in 2023, she was named one of the wealthiest celebrities in the U.S. with an estimated net worth of $440 million.
Witherspoon began her career as a teenager, making her screen debut in The Man in the Moon (1991). After starring in the 1996 films Freeway and Fear, her breakthrough came in 1999 with a supporting role in Cruel Intentions and the lead role of Tracy Flick in the black comedy Election. She gained wider recognition for playing Elle Woods in the comedy Legally Blonde (2001) and its 2003 sequel, and for starring in the romantic comedy Sweet Home Alabama (2002). She won the Academy Award for Best Actress for portraying June Carter Cash in the musical biopic Walk the Line (2005). She had a downturn in her career and during that era, her sole box-office success was the romantic drama Water for Elephants (2011), She made a comeback, producing and starring as Cheryl Strayed in the drama Wild (2014), which earned her a second Academy Award nomination.
Since then she has primarily worked in television, producing and starring in several female-led literary adaptations under her company Hello Sunshine. They include the HBO drama series Big Little Lies (2017–2019), the Apple TV+ drama series The Morning Show (2019–present), and the Hulu miniseries Little Fires Everywhere (2020). For the first of these, she won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Limited Series. She has produced the film adaptations Gone Girl (2014) and Where the Crawdads Sing (2022), and the miniseries adaptation Daisy Jones & the Six (2023).
Witherspoon owns Reese's Book Club and a clothing company, Draper James. She is involved in children's and women's advocacy organizations. She serves on the board of the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) and was named Global Ambassador of Avon Products in 2007, serving as honorary chair of the charitable Avon Foundation dedicated to women's causes.
Early life
Laura Jeanne Reese Witherspoon was born on March 22, 1976, at Southern Baptist Hospital in New Orleans. Her father, John Draper Witherspoon Sr., a medical doctor, served as a lieutenant in the United States Army Reserve and was in private practice as an otolaryngologist until 2012. Her mother, Mary Elizabeth "Betty" (née Reese) Witherspoon, holds a PhD in pediatric nursing and was a professor of nursing at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. Witherspoon's parents are still legally married, although they separated in 1996. Witherspoon has claimed descent from Scottish-born John Witherspoon, who signed the United States Declaration of Independence, although her claim has not been verified by genealogists from the Society of the Descendants of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence.
Witherspoon grew up an Episcopalian and expresses pride in her "definitive Southern upbringing," which she said gave her "a sense of family and tradition" and taught her about "being conscientious about people's feelings, being polite, being responsible, and never taking for granted what you have in your life." At age seven, she was selected as a model for a florist's television commercials, which motivated her to take acting lessons. At age 11, she earned first place at the Ten-State Talent Fair. She received high grades in school and was an avid reader. She has been described as a "multi-achiever," whom her parents nicknamed "Little Type A." She attended middle school at Harding Academy and graduated from the all-girls Harpeth Hall School in Nashville, where she was a cheerleader. She later attended Stanford University as an English literature major, but left before graduating to pursue an acting career.
Career
1991–2000: Early work and breakthrough
Witherspoon attended an open casting call in 1991 for The Man in the Moon, intending to audition for a bit part, but instead was cast for the lead role of Dani Trant, a 14-year-old country girl who falls in love for the first time with her 17-year-old neighbor. The film takes place in her native State of Louisiana. According to The Guardian, her performance made an early impression. Film critic Roger Ebert commented, "Her first kiss is one of the most perfect little scenes I've ever seen in a movie." For her role, Witherspoon was nominated for a Young Artist Award, in the category of Best Young Actress. Later that year, she made her television debut role in Wildflower with Patricia Arquette. In 1992, Witherspoon appeared in the television film Desperate Choices: To Save My Child, portraying a critically ill young girl.
In 1993, Witherspoon played a young wife, Nonnie Parker, in the CBS miniseries Return to Lonesome Dove, appeared in the Disney film A Far Off Place, and had a minor role in Jack the Bear, which garnered her the Young Artist Award for Best Youth Actress Co-star. The next year, she had another leading role as Wendy Pfister in the film S.F.W., directed by Jefery Levy. In 1996, Witherspoon starred in two major films: the thriller Fear alongside Mark Wahlberg, as Nicole Walker, a teenager who starts dating a man with obsessive tendencies, and the black-comedy thriller Freeway, alongside Kiefer Sutherland and Brooke Shields, in which she played Vanessa Lutz, a poor girl living in Los Angeles who encounters a serial killer on the way to her grandmother's home in Stockton. The film received positive reviews from critics; San Francisco Chronicle's Mick LaSalle wrote, "Witherspoon, who does a Texas accent, is dazzling, utterly believable in one extreme situation after the other." Witherspoon's performance won her the Best Actress Award at the Cognac Police Film Festival and helped establish her as a rising star. The production of the film also gave her significant acting experience; she said "Once I overcame the hurdle of that movie – which scared me to death – I felt like I could try anything."
In 1998, Witherspoon had major roles in three films: Overnight Delivery, Pleasantville and Twilight. In Pleasantville, she starred with Tobey Maguire in a tale about 1990s teenage siblings who are magically transported into the setting of a 1950s television series. She portrayed Jennifer, the sister of Maguire's character who is mainly concerned about appearances, relationships and popularity. Her performance earned her praise and garnered her the Young Hollywood Award for Best Female Breakthrough Performance. Director Gary Ross applauded her efforts, saying "she commits to a character so completely and she understands comedy".
In 1999, Witherspoon co-starred with Alessandro Nivola in the drama thriller Best Laid Plans; she played Lissa, a woman who schemes with her lover Nick to escape a small dead-end town. Also in 1999, she co-starred with Sarah Michelle Gellar and Ryan Phillippe in the drama Cruel Intentions, a modern version of the 18th-century French novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses. The critic for San Francisco Chronicle praised her performance as Annette Hargrove: "Witherspoon is especially good in the least flashy role, and even when called upon to make a series of cute devilish faces, she pulls it off." She also appeared in a music video by Marcy Playground for the film's soundtrack. Next, she appeared in Election (1999) opposite Matthew Broderick, based on Tom Perrotta's novel of the same name. For her portrayal of Tracy Flick, she earned acclaim and her first nominations in the Golden Globes and in the Independent Spirit Awards. She also won the Best Actress Award from the National Society of Film Critics and the Online Film Critics Society. Witherspoon received a rank on the list of 100 Greatest Film Performances of All Time by Premiere. Director Alexander Payne said "She's [Witherspoon] got that quality that men find attractive, while women would like to be her…